The Spencer Gillen Expedition

THE BLACKS OF THE INTERIOR.
[By Professor Baldwin Spencer, in the
Melbourne 'Age.' I ?
A day or two after our arrival at Alice
Springs the natives began one of their ordi
nary corroborees. The Arnnta name for
these is Altherta. and each one usual
lasts night alter night tor perhaps a fort
night or three weeks. For hours during
the day time the men are decorating each
other with down which they gather from
the seed cases of a Portulaca; this is
: either rubbed in gypsum to make it white,
or in red ochre to make it red. The men
sit down in a group with nil their materials
ready. These are comparatively simple,
red oehiv and gypsui-», witii stone.-t on
which to grind them, little, heaps of down,
twigs of some bush, such as a cassia, and
then, when all is ready, some of them tie
a hair strimr tightly round their arms, and
with a sharp Hake cut one of tlie veins,
and allow the blood to pour down into the
hole in a shield made for the hand, or into
the concavity of a spear-thrower. Then
first of all each performer has his hair
tied up- with cassia twigs bound round with
human hair string, which he undoes from
his hair girdle. When this is over a little
brush i» made out of a twig with string
wound round one end, and with this some
of the congealed blood is smeared over the
parts where the down- has to be put on,
and gradually the design characteristic of
the special corroboree being performed is
drawn npon the body. Singing of the
corroboree song goes on all the time, the
notes alternately rising and falling, while
one or two men keep time with tho chang
ing of their boomerangs. Towards sun
down all is readyj and at dusk fires are
lighted on the corroboree ground, and the
women and children come and group them
selves in 'front of the dancer.--, together
with the men who arc not performing, the
nien singing, and all of the audience keep
ing time with sticks and boomerangs.
The first corroboree which they started
after onr arrival at Alice Springs was one
called Chichingalla. It was jnst about as
monotonous as most corroborecs are. The
men danced sometimes with staves in their
hand*, sometimes with a cleft stick rest
ing on their shoulders, advancing out of
the darkness into the light of the fire?
with leafy twigs tied round their ankles,
and stamping upon the ground. At times
the performers, who varied from six to 32
in number, would divide into two parties,
one passing to one side, and one to the
other, and then skipping across much as
if they were changing sides in a square
dance. After watehih- this and listening
to the monotonous singing and clanging
of boomerangs on the part of the audience,
which never seemed to weary, we usually
took advantage of the interval, when the
women, at a given signal, retired a little
distance away to allow of the men. having
a spell and quiet chat, and left them to
continue with the second part of tiie pro
gramme, which was never completed until
the early hours of the morning.
So as to enable us to secure some records
of ono of these characteristic dances, they
rehearsed some of the scenes— a full dress
rehearsal, of course, except so far as the
size r.f the audience was concerned— as soon
as they 4wd finished decorating themselves
before sundown. The only reafly interest
ing part was tlie very end, when, unlike
most of the ordinary corroblwrees, one man
was crtpccially decorated with birds' down.
The lir.st part «l the performance consisted
of the usual uninteresting dance, but after a
short pause all of the dancer*, 12 in number
on this occasion, rangid theinsulves in front
of a little lxiHgh wurley, which had been
built at- the beginning of the corroborec,
while the audieirce, wnristing of about 100
men. women, and children, stood up, all
of them evidently nnietb excited. l-own
from a low rise two men can*; creeping,
tlie leader carrying a shield in front of
him, as if to prevent the man U-hJnd from
being seen. This man was elaborately de
corated with lines down all over his head
and the upper part ot Ins body, anu had
a circlet of white and pink feaiier tufts
radiuins from his head like the points of a
irreat tiara. Suddenly he leaned forward,
and hddinc a fcpear tipped with a. bunch of
feathers in both hands, charged the dancers
who were standing in front of his wurley.
Amidst the loud shouting of the men and
women, Uie latter all as it ?were warding
him off with extended arms, he kept charg
ing and recharging tlie performers, who ran
sideways, backwards, and forward's in front
of the wurley, shouting and prancing about
wildly. Suddenly an old man came out
of tlie audience and set fire to a-sreat heap
of shrubs placed on one .fide. The excifte
ment on the part of tlxc audience became
more intense, and grew still greater when
the decorated man. having forced his way
through the dnneerF, die litter ranged up
behind him, following him as he danced
wildly round and round. Tin's was the
signal for the women and children to rc
tjre, which they did precipitately. No sooner
Wd they gone ihnn, amidst the loud
yells of the men and the clashing of boom
crangp, the wurley was sot on fire, vlie
dancers stamping and jumping upon it until
it was one mass of flames, which lighted up
the thin scrub all around and shone weirdly
on tire bodies of the men who were still
dancing madly with excitement. Gradually
ii subsided until only a heap of glowing
ash remained, the outlines of the hills and
trees and the bodies of the natives grew
indistinct, and the corroborec was aver.
It is a strange fact that the words of the
owroboree song liave no meaning to the
performers. They are nanded on from group
to group along with the dance itself, and
doubtless undergo sinme ciituipe as they pass
from a. tribe speaking one dialect to another
speaking quite a different one. Simple in
many ways and monotonous though they
are, still the various movements must re
quire a good deal of careful thinking ont
on the part of the originators and a good
deal of receptive capacity on the part of
those to whom they are handed on if they
are to bz correctly performed. Curiously
enough every corroborce in this part of the
continent appears to have been received
from the north. This particular one, for
example, is evidently identical with the
Molonca dance described by Dr. Roth in
his work on tlie Queensland natives, and
has come down to the Aranta tribe from
tiieir north-western neighbours, the Upirm
tribe, Who doubtless received il from tlie
Waagai tribe, which extends away again
still further to the norcn-west into Queens
land.
No sooner was thia over than the very
next day the natives started a second cor
roborce called Illionpa, in which, apart
from the slight difference in the movements
and die fact that in one scene a man was
represented in ihe act of what, is called
giving 'mania' to a sleeping man, there
was little of interest. This giving 'of ''ma-
nia*' consisted in one cftlie decorated men
advancing quietly towards the spot where
another of tiie performers was lying on the
ground and touching the foot of the Lutter
with his own. The pnisai was supposed to
be contained in a minute piece of stone,
which had been sung over and thus en
dowed with evil magic, and in mis form is
supposed to be very potent.
Information. — She — 'What, does this
mam about all just government deriving its
authority from the consent of the govern
ed?'' Ho— 'It means that when a man gets
married he practically agrees to take the
consequences'.'